She yawned and stretched. He watched her body go taut and heard the little high-pitched noise she made at the back of her throat. Before he knew it, he’d slipped out of bed and was heading for her. But she saw him coming and stepped away.

“I don’t think so.”

He almost groaned. She wasn’t going back into “stay away from Conall” mode again, was she?

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah.” She walked to the bathroom. “You’ve got something else to do.”

“Which is?”

She looked at him from the bathroom doorway. “Help with the soap.”

* * *

One shower and three orgasms later, they’d made it to the diner. Conall kept staring at her over his orange juice while they waited for their food. She tried to ignore him but the man didn’t make it easy. Especially when he kept growling.

“Stop doing that.”

“Stop doing what?”

“Growling.”

“It makes you wet, doesn’t it?”

She tried to glare at him over her cup of coffee but one look at that beautiful, wicked face and it took all her strength not to nail him right there in the booth.

“Bastard.”

“Not according to my mother.”

Conall was deep into his third helping of waffles and bacon—the man could really pack it away—when her friends showed up. They all tried to squeeze into the booth, but with Conall on one side that was just not happening. So Ben and Craig pulled chairs to the side and Miki made Kenny and Amy sit next to her. There was no way she’d let Amy anywhere near Conall.

“So?”

Her friends exchanged glances and immediately she began to worry.

“What?”

“I’ll tell her.” Amy looked at her. “Now don’t freak out, but we found a password-protected folder in Leucrotta’s computer. It had your information in it.”

“What do you mean? What information?”

“Everything. Social Security number, bank accounts, gym membership.”

Kenny Liu leaned forward. “Plus a detailed list of your daily activities the last five or six months. And by the way, you live a really boring life.”

“We did a trace and it seems like he hired a PI. Someone local to you,” Ben added.

Conall pushed his nearly empty plate away and leaned back in the booth. He wasn’t saying anything, just calmly listening to her friends.

“We also found a folder for Angelina,” Craig muttered softly. “It had the same kind of info.”

She should have been freaking out. She should have been screaming her head off and seeing all possible disastrous scenarios that could occur. And although part of her brain was working on contingency plans should things get out of hand, she didn’t feel the need to startany kind of global panic. She knew Conall and the Pack would do what they could to protect her and Angelina. She also knew she was too mean to take crap from anybody. She liked the fact that she was finally starting to enjoy that part of herself. It’s what made her who she was.

Miki nodded. “Okay. Thanks.”

“That’s it? ‘Okay. Thanks.’ That’s all we’re getting?” Amy looked at her. “You’re not freaking out, which tells me you’re not surprised.”

“I’m not surprised. But that’s all I can really tell you.”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m not going to argue about this with you, Amy. So let it fuckin’ go.”

“What else do you need us to do?” Kenny Liu cut in before Amy could start ranting.

For the first time since her friends arrived, Conall spoke, “Nothing. Don’t do anything. And clean up your tracks. They should never know you were there.”

“They? Who’s they?” As the King of Paranoia, Craig was all over that little statement. But Miki knew she couldn’t tell him the truth. It wasn’t her truth to tell. So she lied.

“Mafia.”

Conall’s head snapped around and stared at her. She gave the smallest eyebrow raise.

“Mafia?” Amy turned her body in the booth so she could stare Miki in the face. “The Mafia? You expect us to buy that the Mafia is out to get you?”

Conall leaned forward, his most innocent expression on that dangerously misleading face. “Hey. That’s not something we’d lie about.”

Miki looked at Amy. She had to. If she stared at Conall a second longer, she would start giggling hysterically.

He returned his gaze to Craig. “And if they find out you were there, we’ll find your body in the back of a Cadillac with your tongue cut out.”

Miki bit the inside of her cheek and kicked Conall under the table.

She watched the range of emotions pass over her friends’ faces. Ben had stopped listening, which meant he was bored. Kenny Liu appeared truly concerned. Craig looked like he would pass out from the panic. And Amy restlessly tapped her fingers against the Formica table and glowered.

“You must be insane if you expect us to buy that load of shit.”

“There’s a lot about me you guys don’t know.”

“You’re lying, Kendrick. You and Conan the Barbarian.”

Miki and Conall looked innocently at each other then back at her friends.

She shook her head sadly. “It hurts me that you think I’m lying.”

Conall sighed. “It hurts us both.”

She would have really lost it then if she and Conall weren’t busy kicking each other under the table.